All right, kiddo. If you have questions, stop me. If I don’t know, I’ll find out. But this is pretty important, and I need you to listen.

When we talk about the beginning of America, we talk about white men like Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton and James Madison.

It’s important to understand that when they put together the Declaration of Independence, they were breaking the law. If we had lost the Revolutionary War, they would have been put to death. These men were traitors. They responded to their government with words, protests, speeches and violence.

They were willing to die for some of their beliefs. Primarily, they were willing to die for their own freedom.

But there was a problem. Even though they talked a good game about enslaved Black (and Indigenous people) deserving to be free… they personally enslaved people (in the case of Madison and Jefferson,) or helped family members enslave people (Hamilton.)

Philosophically, they believed all people should be free, but they made exceptions for themselves and their families, because it was more convenient for them to enslave people than to not.

And they made exceptions for the new American government, which was just being founded. The Southern States insisted they needed to enslave people to keep their economy going, and they weren’t going to be part of America if they had to stop enslaving people.

Those founding fathers, who all at one time or another had expressed that enslaving people was wrong, decided not to abolish slavery when they formed our new nation.

It was more convenient for them to kick that issue to another time. They decided that, overall, it was more important to break free from Britain and form our own nation first. They could hash out rights for enslaved people later. It was an important issue, but not the most important to them. Especially because they personally benefitted from enslavement.

And that’s why the enslavement of people continued for another EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS, because James Madison, Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton decided that the rights of Black people could wait.

Enslaved people were forced to build the White House. They were forced to serve at West Point, and Harvard and Yale. Their families were torn apart, their children sold, their loved ones separated from them. They were beaten and abused, for another EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS, because the white men who founded the United States thought that their liberty could wait.

Finally, came the Civil War. Which was brutal and bloody and ended enslavement in the United States in name. But not so much in practice. Because as soon as enslaved people were freed, the white men in charge changed the laws. Special rules to be allowed to vote. Separate schools for Black children. Laws about where Black people could live, who they could love, where they could work.

For another NINETY-NINE years, Black people were pushed aside, limited in their life options, denied a vote they technically had already earned the right to make. There was even a special kind of murder called Lynching that was made up just for Black people.

White people would group up to capture a Black person, and they would kill them for sport or entertainment. Sure, sometimes they claimed it was justice — but there was no judge. No jury. Just a crowd of excited executioners.

During that NINETY-NINE years, women started the Suffrage movement. Women deserved the vote! And early on, Black and white women marched together as suffragettes. Until the movement started to get some traction. There was a lot of resistance among white men to give white women the vote. And Black women? Definitely not. That was a step too far.

So the Black women who had marched, fought, suffered and spent time in jail with the other founders of the Suffrage movement, were cut out of the movement. By white women, including Susan B. Anthony, who said the most important thing is that women get the vote. Once we get the vote for us, then we can fight for the vote for you.

Once again, white people told Black people to wait to get the same rights. Once again, white people told them that they had to get a wedge in the door; then they could fight for Black people to have those rights, too.

NINETY-NINE YEARS passed, between the Civil War and the Civil Rights Acts. EIGHTY-FIVE passed from the beginning of the Revolutionary War to the Civil War. ONE HUNDRED FIFTY-SEVEN years passed between White people bringing the first enslaved Black people to what would become the United States. In all, THREE HUNDRED FORTY-ONE YEARS during which Black people were told they needed to wait for their freedom.

And it has been FIFTY-TWO YEARS since we promised Black people with the Civil Rights Acts that finally, finally they deserved a place in the “more perfect union” originally described by the founding fathers.

And during that FIFTY-TWO YEARS, countless Black men and women have been killed, in the name of protecting white women, or white property, or simply because a white person was offended that a Black person actually wanted to be treated as equal.

Today, as we stand in year FIFTY-TWO since the United States government finally passed the laws that Hamilton and Madison and Jefferson decided could wait, Black people are asking the government to stop killing them.

You, my white child, have a job to do. And that job is to listen. That job is to learn. That job is to understand that every single thing you do in life was built on the backs of enslaved people. The very foundation of this nation demanded that Black people suffer and die, so that white people could prosper.

You probably feel pretty bad right now. You might even feel mad. After all, you never did any of those terrible things.

But here’s the thing: you benefit anyway. Every time you get a speeding ticket, and never once worry that the police will kill you, you benefit. Every time you put in a resume and you aren’t judged by your name or your zip code, you benefit. Every time you rent an apartment and it goes smoothly, every time you go to the grocery store and no one follows you, every time people call you spirited instead of thuggish, you benefit.

So today, you learn. Today, you listen. And tomorrow, you understand that it’s not enough to harm no one. You have to actively help. You have to speak up. You have to defend people who aren’t allowed to safely defend themselves. You have to tell your friends or your family or even both, that their racist speech is wrong.

You have to understand that no one can “take” your place, at a job, at a school, anywhere. If all places are available to all people, you must understand that none of them were promised to you. None of them belonged to you. Even though sometimes, it might feel like the world — the white world around you — says otherwise.

Because for THREE HUNDRED NINETY-THREE years, Black parents have given their children a Talk, and that talk is all about how to survive just one more day in this society.

Today, it’s my job to give you this talk. To admit how we have benefitted from the suffering of others. To explain why we aren’t rich people, but we still have massive amounts of privilege. It’s my job to tell you where I’ve gone wrong, and to help you start out better than I did.

Today, I’m telling you that from now until you become earth and dust and starseed again, that it’s not enough to recognize they’ve waited long enough. It’s only enough when you’ve fought to make sure they don’t wait one second more.

One second.

Starting now.

Go.